Letters to the editor: 04-12-2017

Wednesday

Apr 12, 2017 at 12:01 AM

Contributed Content

The left's God

In response to: "With God’s help," April 5, 2017 ... The beginning quote: “With God’s help, true Americans are prevailing against American’s enemies, especially” etc. ... sort of begs a question or two, just to clear things up in my mind. 1.) Would a “patriotic American” publicly call their duly elected president a: “liar, crook, traitor and all around scumbag” — or would they be thinking of positive ways to correct the unfortunate 2016 presidential error? Well I guess he might — if “celebrating” the president’s disappearing credibility and record low approval ratings, and the mounting “evidence” of his ties to Russia’s Vladimir Putin. And perhaps, if his celebration could also include the totally inept and unpopular houses of Congress, who are working to deny even more Americans with the basic right to health care coverage — while giving huge tax cuts to the wealthiest of Americans — as usual.

Now there are some on both sides who are insisting that an independent council be appointed and all of the dirty laundry regarding Trump’s “alleged” ties to the Evil Empire be investigated and put to bed once and for all. Maybe, at the same time, the council could look into the leaking or publishing (or the inventing) of pertinent information that could endanger an individual’s right to privacy, normally protected by our constitution. Hmm?

An unbiased, and independent council to determine the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth — so help me God! (Someone might be smiling and whispering to themselves: “Be careful what you wish for, huh?”)

Oh, I almost forgot question 2.) What does the left’s God (that’s God with an uppercase “G”) think about the 56.7 million babies aborted since the 1973 Roe vs. Wade decision? And where does the majority (those who are not “oblivious to reality”) stand on that? Just curious.

Philip D. Pederson

Apple Valley

C'mon, guys!

Open letter to my fellow experimenters. As I might have mentioned in an earlier letter, my thanks for "Let's Invent," and for the first, April 2, "People's inventions fuel American manufacturing," bewailing our abandonment of innovation in favor of the cheaper foreign products, supposedly encouraging the US to dominate in higher grades of tech. However, as a tinkerer myself I couldn't agree more with Sam Asano, the former electronics manufacturer, who "…was highly skeptical of the theory…," after US having "…accumulated $20 trillion in national debt…." (Reader will forgive lousy typographical pun).

…his excellent article concluding with a plea to guys like me inviting us to submit our ideas in secrecy so as not to invalidate any possible future patent. So I have a couple of recent ideas I'd like my compatriots to entertain — which however are only in a sort of general form, that will require some actual inventing in order to implement:

(1) Since the establishment of those dumb Drought Regs (as I might also have proposed in an earlier missive), in order to avoid freezing damage the nuisance of getting up in the night to insulate, turn off, empty, or reset our water timers, why not instead a timer that can survive the occasional winter snow: A simple internal temp sensor when sensing a potential freeze shuts down and at the same ties/empties the unit by opening a valve at the bottom. My fellow gadgeteers will think of several clever ways to achieve this, and surely similar approaches even simpler, far surpassing the slow, plodding, and narcissistic response typical of our Manufacturing "Engineer" who cynically rejects any suggestion from us "amateurs."

(2) My own toilet problems immediately suggest a few more innovations: (a) Redesign of the bowl and immediate plumbing that won't trap any small object falling from our shirt at at flush time after that big job that now requires 3 to 6 repeated flashings 'til the ministrations of a plumber for $200 to $300, who will do it wrong anyway, leaving deep scratches around its bottom; and (b) Why not eliminate the need for that clumsy and complicated ball-and-valve that so oft goes awry? Several possibilities instantly pop to mind….

Guys, join me in our valiant quest!

Dale Hileman

Apple Valley

Gov. Brown strikes again

Well, what’s new, once again our fearless leader Governor Moonbeam Brown taxes us again. Isn't enough we have the highest gas prices and taxes in the nation? No I guess not because last night the liberal tax-and-spend happy Democrats once again passed a huge tax on us.

And on top of that a registration fee increase, now how are we supposed to know what that is going to cost, are they going to use Blue Book on determining if our car is above the $5,000 limit or the $25,0000 "luxury car" threshold (yeah try and buy a luxury new car for $25,000!)? How is this value determined? I went on blue book for my BMW. They not only ask mileage, model, but even the color of the car comes up, so how do they determine the value?

I cannot understand why everyone seems to vote Democrat in this state, do they like these constant taxes increases, that people like this governor who started way back in the '70s do to us until we cannot afford it ? Enough of it. I will never vote Democrat in this state. Fed up with it. He is on his last year or so of being governor so he really had nothing to lose and really stuck us with a burden with these fees.

Gary Pearson

Hesperia

Cadiz Water Project

I see once again that the Cadiz Water Project is under continued consideration. My question is why? Are you nuts? An Orange County Water District is driving this consideration, to try to ensure that they will have enough water to continue their growth into the future.

Their plan this time is to go to the one place that has the least amount of available water, charge their customers huge amounts of fees to acquire this water, and then struggle through mountains of environmental, financial, and legal hoops in order to steal this water from the rightful users of the resource. Those rightful users would be the plants, animals and yes, even the humans that live on top of this water aquifer. The rightful users would not be the money hungry thieves that would destroy an already depleted desert environment of the only source of life it has.

These thieves have convinced their backers that this Cadiz area aquifer is vast and unwanted, underused, and valueless to its rightful owners. Wrong! If this aquifer is drawn down, the entire Mojave Desert, and any underused resource, is at risk of this same type of extortion.

My recommendation to the proponents of this plan is to go where the water is, you idiots! Don’t drain the Mojave because it’s nearby and the population cannot defend themselves from your greed. It’s a desert for a reason, knuckleheads! But, that’s just my opinion as a 47-year Mojave Desert resident.